Why fit in, when you were born to stand out?
Dr Seuss
A brilliant quality about humans is that we are all unique.
Sadly, when we are young we want to conform, to be like others, and to fit in. Our tribal nature seeks wisdom from the crowd.
Part of maturing into an individual is embracing our own nutcase. Letting go of who you think you should be, to become who you were born to be.
I think this is one of the most important things you can do with your life.
Most of the happiest people I know are pleasantly occupied being themself, they don’t have time to worry over what society thinks they should be.
It makes them so much more interesting to be with. Who doesn’t want to hang out with confident happy people that define their own path?
Owning yourself is the best way to become more interesting and it doesn’t require any formula or rules, besides noticing the possibilities hidden behind your fears.
Relaxing and growing into your own unique flavour of oddball is an organic process, but it does not feel natural. Facing your fears is denying one part of yourself to embrace another part.
It is an internal thing rather than copying someone else.
Instead of instructions, I have some stories for you. They show how some of my own self-talk went with things that I found mind-bendingly difficult to start doing but how easy it become once I’d stepped through that door.
Space-hoppers are terrible forms of transport
I’ve been looking at world records and found quite a few Space-hopper themed ones. Those silly things for kids to bounce around the garden on. Except I want to do things like a marathon on one or record the fastest record mile on one.
To practice I’ve had to leave the safety of the garden and go into the road and bike lines to bounce around. There is something about the bounce of a space hoppers that really feels designed to make you look like an idiot.
Before I did it I felt kind of naughty or that I would annoy people. No one does it so it must be wrong.
I felt like i was going to mess up the bike lanes for cyclists. Cars always hate bikes so a guy on a space hopper must be even worse right?
But instead what happened is that strangers loved it. I don’t mean that lightly. I had people genuinely come up to me telling them I’m made their day, it is just totally dumb and no one expects it. I had people offering me lifts, stopping for a chat and a shit load of waving, smiling and car horns.
No one cared in the slightest I was in the way because I was being an oddball. They were just happy to see a human doing something for fun.
I swiftly concluded the only reason people never used space-hoppers is because they are a shit form of transport. They are such hard work you may as well just walk and carry it which negates the point of the space hopper.
There is nothing naughty or wrong about using a space-hopper. However, the fact that no one ever uses them pushes my internal “please the tribe” human brain to alert me that it must be wrong to do. It is completely not conforming, so obviously it must be bad.
Yet actually I caused more joy to others than I could have ever known. I had a tonne of fun and developed the confidence to do more strange things that make me happy.
Men in dresses are cool 💃
Last week I attended the WebSummit tech conference.
This is a place where lots of startups and investors go. They network, pitch business ideas and find out about the leading edges in technology.
It’s a cool but stressful place to be. Lots of entrepreneurs trying to find investors. It is a performance where they can feel they lose their personality and sense of uniqueness as they get judged along with all the other startups.
I did something I’ve wanted to do for a while, I wore a bright pink dress in public for the hell of it. I walked around the conference interviewing people about their mental health, burnout, and expectations for their business. I often got lost in tangents about their sexuality, hobbies and existential life thoughts.
For some reason, I was super scared about the idea of wearing a dress as a (mostly) straight guy. It isn’t natural for me, men don’t wear dresses because they want to. They might wear them as a joke, but not to look good.
Yet, I also think a guy can look nice when they do wear one, it can be much more expressive than conventional ‘guy clothes’.
Each day of the conference I looked at the dress as I put on my clothes and didn’t find the balls to put it on.
Finally, on the last day of the conference, I actually did it. Sort of.
It was a tight dress and you can roll up the bottom half so it just looks like a vest, so I went into the conference in a bright pink vest and shorts which was odder than nothing but not exactly wearing a dress.
It was enough to get a lot of comments and high-fives. It took a conversation with someone about why I was in bright pink to actually explain it was a dress and he gave me the nudge to just wear the dress properly already.
So I’m not that brave.
Yet once I was eventually in it, everyone thought I was that confident brave guy that just casually puts on a dress if he feels like it.
Respect
People were instantly at ease with a guy who had put himself out there. It was like a magnet to people that wanted to have fun and be nice.
I had beautifully candid conversations with so many people who could just relax from the pressure of the conference. They could hang out with this odd guy who was genuinely interested in asking questions about them as an individual.
By visually being more of myself it made it easier for others to open up.
I spoke to people about their fears and hopes and dreams. Stuff they hadn’t even told anyone else. It was nuts. So many people had this hidden side they didn’t know how to express and were just inspired to see me doing it myself.
I had so many random people come up to me to tell me how nice I looked or just let me know that they had super respect. They didn’t care if I was straight, bi or gay and were just happy that I was being me.
It’s crazy how close I was to not doing it because of fear.
It just didn’t feel safe and I couldn’t work out why at the time.
No one had ever told me that this was a thing you do when you grow up. There were no role models or influences beyond an internal feeling that I wanted to know what it would be like.
I had no idea what I expected, but the reaction was so overwhelmingly positive.
Also, if you want to make an impression and be remembered, I was way more memorable as the only person in a bright pink dress... Whereas every other entrepreneur was just, another entrepreneur.
Just like with the space hopper, I accidentally ended up making a bunch of people’s day just by trying to have fun myself. The opposite side of my fear was more enjoyable than I had imagined.
Dare yourself
I’m not saying you should go wear a dress if you’re a man (although I would say it’s great and I’ll probably dive into this area further in the future)
The point is that if there is anything that you feel is a bit socially awkward or you are scared of doing. Just try it. It’s okay to start small.
Generally, we assume much worse things will happen than ever do. We are built to be self-protective. Stepping into the unknown fills our imagination with perilous disaster and rejection.
You might just surprise yourself with how much better results can be than anything your imagination can come up with.
So whatever your dreams or fears are, face them.
Don’t take a course, don’t read a book. You already know the things you wonder about doing.
Go find out what it’s like.
There has never been anyone like us…and there never will be again. We have been given a complete and total monopoly over the business of being us.
Be the only one of you in the whole world.
That’s where the fun is (without having to fake it).
That’s where the money is (you can name your price).
That’s where the value is (you can’t be replaced).
Ryan Holiday